This invention is related generally to the fields of networking, computing, and directories, and specifically to providing an aliasing operation in directories such as hierarchical directories such that the binary data stored in entries in a directory can be accessed using aliases without storing multiple copies of the entries for each user. The disclosure uses LDAP (Lightweight Data Access Protocol) as an example. However, the principles of the invention can be extended to other directory structures. The disclosed, illustrative embodiment is designed to execute on a computer such as a desktop, a workstation, a laptop or general-purpose mainframe computers, although alternative embodiments such as special-purpose electronics are possible. LDAP is an open industry standard defining a method for accessing and updating information in a directory. A directory server is an implementation of the LDAP protocol. LDAP is basically a read-centric repository, wherein users can store any kind of data such as names and addresses, binary information such as songs, images and video, applications, files, printers, network resources etc. Data is stored in the directory servers in the form of tree entries. LDAP and other types of directories typically have no way of sharing binary values across a set of directory entries. Typically, users must generate and store independent copies of binary-encoded data for each entry, even if it's the same data that's getting stored. Moreover, there is no good way of accessing binary data based upon some user defined preferences. This can be extremely wasteful of storage space.